Department Celebrates First CalDay in Campbell Hall!

The Department of Astronomy participated in CalDay, the annual event where campus opens its doors to anyone looking to learn more about Berkeley and explore everything the campus has to offer. CalDay attendees came to participate in a number of hands-on events and activities hosted by the department that included building scale models of the solar system, learning how to read the "fingerprints" of stars, solar viewings, and how Astronomers go about measuring distances of stars.

Our portable planetarium was up and running inside Campbell Hall, providing the opportunity for a guided tour of the constellations visible during springtime. SETI and the Space Exploration Society at Berkeley set-up kiosks in the lobby, where people were able to handle instruments used by Astronomers, see footage of observations, and ask their most burning Astronomy-related questions.

In addition, faculty members Gibor Basri and Alex Filippenko, along with SETI research Dan Werthimer, gave lectures that explored the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, what really makes a planet a planet, and research that is currently being conducted at Lick Observatory.

We're already looking forward to next year! A big thank you to our volunteers for all of your hard work!